A FEDERAL judicial panel on Oct. 21 rightly rejected yet another flimsy plan by California officials to reduce prison population. Now the state must come up with a reasonable plan by Thursday or potentially lose control of the prison system. Officials should stop dawdling and get the job done.

The state's prisons are ridiculously overcrowded. California's prison system is 184 percent of capacity with 154,897 inmates.

Federal judges, monitoring a 2002 court settlement between California and prison rights advocates, ruled that the state's prison conditions are so bad as to be an example of unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment.

Even so, the courts had been willing to cut California a break, particularly seeing how hard the economy has hit the state. In August, the courts ordered California to fashion a plan that would release about 40,000 prisoners over a two-year span. But the state submitted a two-year plan to reduce population by just 18,000 and it relied heavily on new prison construction. The judges already had rejected the latter realizing the state was incapable of moving forward with a viable construction plan.

If the state is unable to move forward with any kind of reasonable plan, either the federal court will draw up its own or, judges say, they will leave it to inmate lawyers to sort out.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had the gall to say that the federal judges "are going

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absolutely crazy," and he insists that "they've got to let us run the state." We've seen how well that has gone:

  • With an average of one inmate dying unnecessarily per week and no viable plan of reduction or prison construction coming from the state Legislature, federal judges in 2006 ruled California was no longer capable of running its own prison system and placed it under federal receivership.

  • Court receiver Clark Kelso demanded the state pay $8 billion just to improve conditions, but later was willing to compromise, presenting three options that would drop the price tag to $2.5 billion. He was willing to negotiate, yet Attorney General Jerry Brown called it "diversionary hype" and the deal was off the table.

  • Lawmakers were on the verge of their best idea yet earlier this year. It would have cut $1 billion and chopped the prison population by 37,000 through the early release of nonviolent inmates and those over the age of 60 or medically incapacitated. Despite the support by Schwarzenegger, the state Senate and the Department of Corrections, the plan died under law enforcement pressure in the Assembly.

    In fact, in their most recent ruling, the judges used the plan that would release 37,000 inmates and would not appreciably threaten public safety as a key reason to deny California's latest attempt at compromise.

    No, governor, these judges are not crazy; they are paying attention.

    Opportunities have been squandered and conditions remain dangerous. Inmates are stuffed in like sardines, and riots are popping up more throughout the system.

    Yet the state continues to burn taxpayer money on futile legal attempts. It's beyond time to end this legal wrangling.

    Clearly, the state is capable of devising a plan that can, at least, come close to 40,000 without endangering the public. Scare tactics by critics only complicate the situation.

    Instead of continuing these worthless gambles, and praying for some sort of unlikely miracle with the U.S. Supreme Court, state officials need to finally craft a good plan everyone can live with.

    Reconsider the early release plan backed by the state Senate and expand programs such as education, drug treatment and anger management. Let's help those who want to be helped. That's at least a start.

    It's time to prepare for the inevitable. It's California's responsibility to clean up its own prison system.